Edmund Brownless (tenor)was born in Norwich, England. As a
soloist he has performed throughout Europe and North America. His repertoire and recordings range from medieval music to music of the avant-garde. His musical training began as a chorister in the boys choir of Hereford
Cathedral (photos). After emigrating to Nova Scotia, Canada, he studied voice
with Prof. Marie McCarthy at Acadia University
and Prof.
Jan Simons at McGill
University
in Montréal, where he received the Bachelor of Music and Master of Music degrees
in Performance Voice. He participated in masterclasses and courses with Alfred
Deller, Emma
Kirkby, Nigel Rogers, and Andrea von Ramm. He was an external student at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis in Basel, Switzerland (Richard Levitt) and had voice lessons with Louise André in Montréal, Hilde Wesselmann in Essen and Cornelius L. Reid in
New York. He sings
on many recordings, notably with The Bach Ensemble,
Sequentia, Ensemble Gilles Binchois, Clemencic Consort, The Boston Camerata, Le Studio de musique ancienne de
Montréal, L'Ensemble Claude-Gervaise, and Capilla Flamenca. He has made numerous radio broadcasts for Radio France, BBC, CBC, Radio Canada, NPR, WDR and SWF. Since 1990 he has taughtvoiceand early music atDr. Hoch's
Konservatorium - Musikakademie Frankfurt am Main. From
2009-2014 he taught voice at the Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst Frankfurt am Main. In 2001 he was invited to write an article for the festschrift celebrating Cornelius L. Reid's 90th birthday: "Thoughts on Simple Singing: Towards a More Adequate Vocal Terminology" (The Modern Singing Master: Essays in Honor of Cornelius L. Reid,
Scarecrow Press, 2002). He is one of the few singers that has
specialised in historical pronunciation: English, French and German. In
particular he performs in Early Modern English, on which he worked
intensively with Dr. Charles Barber of Leeds University. He has directed staged productions
of medieval mystery plays, six operas and a musical: Das Hessische Weihnachtsspiel (two productions), Dido and Æneas and Fairy Queen by Henry Purcell, L'Orfeo by Luigi Rossi, Hänsel und Gretel by Engelbert Humperdinck (two productions) and Die gelehrten Frauen by Richard Rudolf Klein. At the English Church, Wiesbaden, he directed a production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. A staged prodution of Henry Purcell's opera Dido and Æneas with orchestra is planned for April 2016. Curriculum vitæ.